The efficiency of government finanical expenditures before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-country investigation.

This paper examines the way government spending affected productivity and its decomposition before and during the COVID-19 outbreak. Using panel data from 158 economies, the research shows that spending on health care increases productivity, while spending on the military slows down productivity and its decompositions. These effects are even greater in the context of COVID-19, showing that spending on health care and avoiding conflict and military escalation will be important for future economies to grow in a sustainable way.

Financing Constraints and Firm's Productivity Under the COVID-19 Epidemic Shock: Evidence of A-Shared Chinese Companies.

Focusing on the financing barriers to firm productivity improvement under the influence of external shocks, we empirically analyze the data of A-share listed companies from 2007-2018 to determine the impact of financing constraints on total factor productivity (TFP) in the context of COVID-19 pandemic and the paths of factor use efficiency and R&D innovation efficiency on this impact using ordinary least-squares (OLS) method. We find that financing constraints are an important factor inhibiting the TFP of firms. This inhibitory effect is more serious in small-scale firms, non-state firms, and non-energy firms. Further investigation shows that the inhibitory effect of financing constraints on firms' TFP is more pronounced when firms are located in the Yangtze River Delta city cluster, the Pearl River Delta city cluster, non-port cities, and provincial capitals. The mechanism test finds that improving the efficiency of capital use and labor use can alleviate the suppressive effect of financing constraints on TFP. The alleviating impact is more significant when capital use efficiency is improved. However, increasing the efficiency of R&D innovation further strengthens the inhibitory effect of financing constraints, and this effect is more pronounced under positive external shocks.

Nous nous concentrons sur les obstacles liés au financement qui entravent l'amélioration de la productivité des entreprises lorsqu'il y a des chocs externes, et nous analysons de façon empirique l'impact des contraintes de financement sur la productivité globale des facteurs des entreprises dans le contexte de la COVID-19, ainsi que les voies permettant l'efficacité d'utilisation des facteurs et l'efficacité de l'innovation en R&D sur cet impact. Pour ce faire, nous utilisons la méthode des moindres carrés ordinaires en nous basant sur les données de sociétés cotées en bourse de 2007 à 2018. Nous constatons que les contraintes de financement représentent un facteur important qui inhibe la productivité globale des facteurs des entreprises. Cet effet inhibiteur est plus prononcé au sein des petites entreprises, des entreprises non gouvernementales et des entreprises non énergétiques. Une autre étude révèle que l'effet inhibiteur des contraintes de financement sur la productivité globale des facteurs des entreprises est plus prononcé lorsque les entreprises sont situées dans le groupe de villes du delta du fleuve Yangtze, dans le groupe de villes du delta de la rivière des Perles, dans les villes non portuaires et dans les capitales provinciales. Le test du mécanisme révèle que l'amélioration de l'efficacité de l'utilisation du capital et de la main-d'œuvre des entreprises peut atténuer l'effet suppressif des contraintes de financement sur la productivité globale des facteurs. L'impact d'atténuation est plus important lorsque l'efficacité d'utilisation du capital est améliorée. Cependant, l'augmentation de l'efficacité de l'innovation en R&D renforce encore l'effet inhibiteur des contraintes de financement, et il est plus prononcé en cas de chocs externes positifs.

The Economics of Agricultural Productivity in South Africa

Accurate measures of productivity growth are an important policy tool but are difficult to obtain in South African circumstances. In this article, we review work on the measurement of farm-level productivity in South Africa since the earliest attempts at multifactor indices in the early 1990s. The focus is on total factor productivity, but single input measures such as labor and land productivity (yields) are also discussed. Measurements using time-series and cross-sectional data are discussed separately, along with measures to explain the effect of climate change. Data deficiencies are also pointed out. The article concludes that international collaboration should be maintained if important issues such as the COVID-19 impact, food security, climate change, and labor market shocks are to be successfully addressed.

Assessing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on China's TFP growth: Evidence from region-level data in 2020.

This paper examines the first wave spread of COVID-19 in China and its impact on TFP growth for 2020, and assess the role of anti-epidemic lockdown policy in suppressing the pandemic. Methodologically, we systematically quantify the disparity in the pandemic's productivity impact and the role of lockdown policies across regions, by combining the prefecture-level TFP growth for 422 regions (including 276 municipal cites and 146 county regions) with the daily statistics on the pandemic. Our results show that the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on TFP growth are more likely to occur in municipal cities, compared to rural areas. Moreover, the anti-epidemic quarantine policy succeeded to bring the COVID-19 pandemic down in China, but it may generate additional costs through dampening TFP growth if overused. Given the regions either with a relative higher resilience level or in the remote rural areas suffered more from the strict regulation. A more flexible policy is required to be designed so as to mitigate the ongoing COVID-19 impacts in future. These findings provide useful insights for China, as well as other Asian developing countries, to cope with its continuing episodes.

WHAT DETERMINES CO-OPERATIVES' PRODUCTIVITY IN INDONESIA? A-TWO STAGE ANALYSIS

This study empirically measures and analyzes determinants of productivity changes of the co-operatives across all 34 provinces in Indonesia over the 2015-2020 period using a-two stage approach. In the first stage, the study measures the productivity of the co-operatives using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). Meanwhile, in the second stage, the study utilizes a panel regression model to measure and analyze the determinants of productivity of the co-operatives in Indonesia. The study recorded that the co-operatives in Indonesia have experienced a 9.7% increase in their Total Factor Productivity (TFP), contributed mainly by the technical efficiency progress. Furthermore, the study found that the business volume has contributed to the improvement of the co-operatives' TFP. Meanwhile, the co-operatives' members, liquidity, and indebtedness are found to deteriorate the TFP growth. Profitability, however, is found to have an insignificant effect on TFP growth due to the non-profit orientation of the co-operatives. These findings suggest the need for cooperatives to diversify their business activities, supported by the adoption of relevant advanced technologies, particularly the use of online marketing. In addition, the co-operatives should improve their financial performances to maximize the use of capital by restricting liquidity and indebtedness. Finally, the government support to enhance financial and managerial aspects is essential to realize the co-operatives as the pillar of Indonesia's economy, as mandated by the 1945 Indonesian constitution.

Korean Economic Growth Factor Analysis with Total Factor Productivity

Korea has recorded negative real GDP growth only three times in the last 60 years: the oil crisis in 1980, the financial crisis in 1998, and the COVID-19 crisis in 2020. While the economic recession for the first time in 22 years may be attributed to COVID-19, it is more noteworthy is that the growth rate of the Korean economy has been continuously declining. To find counter measures for the decline in the economic growth rate, it is necessary to analyze the cause of the decline in the growth rate. The factors of economic growth can generally be divided into changes in input factors such as labor and capital and productivity. We analyzed the relative contribution of each input factor from 1982 to 2020. Our result suggests that the contributions of capital and labor to economic growth are decreasing over time, and the contribution of TFP is gradually increasing. This study is employing annual time series data to provide up-to-date estimates of TFP and exploring the determinants of TFP to help detect future growth engines for the long-run sustainable development in Korea. © 2022 IEEE.

The Zoonotic diseases, agricultural production, and impact channels: Evidence from China.

The outbreak and wide spread of COVID-19 poses a new threat to global food security. This paper aims to address two important policy related issues, that is which agricultural subsector suffers more under zoonotic diseases and how do zoonotic diseases affect these subsectors. Using provincial panel data of 24 main farm commodities in China from 2002 to 2017, this paper identifies the impacts of zoonotic diseases and projects the potential disruption of COVID-19 to agricultural output in China under three scenarios. The main findings are as follows. First, zoonotic diseases have adverse impacts on almost all the farm commodities, while livestock on average suffers more than crops. Second, zoonotic diseases affect these subsectors mainly through the channel of adverse shocks on total factor productivity (TFP). Third, while a few subsectors can find a way to offset part of the TFP loss by applying more input, most subsectors suffer from both input reduction and TFP loss. Fourth, the spread of COVID-19 is projected to lower the growth rates of China's crop and livestock sector by 1.1%-2.3% and 1.3%-2.6%, with TFP loss by 1.1%-2.0% and 1.4%-2.7%, respectively, in 2020. This paper then discusses several policy implications for mitigating the negative impacts of COVID-19 on agricultural production in China and elsewhere.